CYCLE UDHR75 EXHIBITION FOR ARTIVISM 23.11.-30.11.2023 French Institute Baghdad
On the occasion of 75 Years of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), this exhibition - a role model for artistic activism and freedom of expression - presents contemporary works by different artists bringing together sculptures, installations, augmented reality, narratives, videos, poster designs, photography and performance. CYCLE is a collective exhibition and the outcome of a collaborative laboratory where artists, designers and cultural practitioners elaborated specific topics and experimented ways of presentations which culminated in an exhibition tackling three major topics: Nature, Women, 2003. These three elements are closely connected to each other. If one link is missing, the cycle breaks down. CYCLE is a declaration of intent and an invitation to engage. It unfolds as a space of gathering, in which diverse forms of thinking enhance the understanding of what art can be - artivism. CYCLE is a cooperation between Tarkib Organization for Arts & Culture and UNAMI Human Rights Office, hosted in the French Institute Baghdad.
Edited by Tarkib Organization for Arts & Culture
T H E A T R E THE MOTHERLAND Installation Performance Concept: Akram Assam Text: Ayşe Performance: Loay Al Hadhary
Voice: Alaa Hussein Music: Diyar Ziyad
The poetic performance is an appeal to harmony between humankind and nature. History tells us that we should respect nature, follow its laws, and always protect it. Any harm we cause to nature will return to haunt us. During the Industrial Revolution in the last century, humankind created immense material wealth. But it came at the cost of extensive damage to natural resources, which disrupted the ecological and natural balance. Being in the 21st century, it seems that humankind did not learn from history. Where should humanity go from here? Continue Reading:
G A L L E R Y ALARM Sculpture: Found Object, 21.06.2023 Sound: Ahwar Rooster, 22.06.2023
There is a German saying, which I remembered, when we visited the Marshes in summer 2023. The saying goes: “Wo sich Fuchs und Hase gute Nacht sagen.” In English, it is ‘in the back of beyond’ or ‘in the middle of nowhere’. Both translations describe the place and space, that reminded me of the fairytale world of my childhood. In this fairytale world, there was a rooster whose job it was to wake up both, the people and his flock of chickens, every morning. A busy rustling woke me up in the early hours. At exactly 4:26 am, I saw a rooster standing on a stick coming out of the reed house. The rooster dutifully crowed his first kikeriki towards the east. Afterwards, he dutifully went to the next places to crowed his kikeriki in all cardinal directions until the people and the flock of chickens started moving. The kikeriki of the Ahwar rooster is a wake-up call. The shit of the buffalo with the engraved hand of his shapers is a sign that there are humans living in an alarming situation.
CYCLE Newspaper Tarkib Collaboration
In 1930, most of the people got their news by listening to wireless radio. On 18 April 1930, the BBC’s news announcer had nothing to communicate. “There is no news,” was the script of the 20:45 news bulleting. Piano music was played for the rest of the 15-minutes segment. 105 years later, we imagine a similar scenery. The newspaper is not disappeared and our script is: “There is only good news today.”
THE REED STORY Comic Book Illustration: Noor Al Waily Text: Hella Mewis Design: Atef Al Jaffal
The comic depicts concerns in regard to climate migration, overpopulation and urban planning. The cover of the booklet is made by weaved reed blades which were collected during a field trip on June 22, 2023 in Ahwar Southern Iraq. Took out of its family roots, the reed travelled to Baghdad without Salwa having prepared the right environment.
REGENERATE: BUFFALOES Comic Book Illustration: Muhaned Taha Text: Amir Akram Design: Amir Akram
If the buffalo runs out of water, his eyes becomes red, because the clay, usually under water, effects his eye. If the eye is red he is sentenced to death. The story follows a herd of buffaloes, from its peak to its destruction and the future we want to see them to live in. Continue Reading:
MESSAGES FROM THE FUTURE Sculpture: Found Object, 21.03.2023, Sawa Lake Messages: Tarkib Collaboration
Amnah Ali refers in her cartoons either to the Iraqi Women Football Team or to boby. Boby is the dog character known from the chewing gum “boby Bubble”. “boby Bubble” is a typical Iraqi product that started to be driven out of the market, but still exists. The Iraqi “boby” shares the market now with three other brands: “Yobi” and “Toni”, made in Iran, and “Robi”, made in Lebanon. Boby is for Amnah, and for all of us, a symbol of Iraqi identity. Messages from the future follow boby, discovering symbols of Iraqi identity, which are these days close to disappear, like boby: Al Ahwar, Habaniye, Furat, Diyala Orange, Iraqi Trade Union and Ashur.
DIYALA ORANGE Purchased Object: Tarkib Collaboration Mummification: Mawada Ahmed
Diyala is officially given the title “Orange Capital of the Middle East”. The province is still using the slogan for its own marketing, engraved in the entrance gate to the province. But, what is if there is not enough water? The Citrus Sinensis alias Diyala Orange, part of the Iraqi identity, is going to disappear for two main reasons. The first reason is the drops in sales due to less expensive orange imports, especially from Turkey and Egypt. Even though the taste of the Iraqi orange is much better and still has an affordable price, but people prefer the imports because they are simply cheaper. If you govern a family of eight, you do not really have a choice, you take the cheaper ones. The second reason is the decline of surface and rain water, which is necessary for an orange to grow. The Diyala Orange used to have a typical orange colour. But, because of insufficient water resources the colour remains green to yellow or green-yellow. The fruit stays green due to the chlorophyll produced on the peel of orange citrus to protect itself from sunburn. Chlorophyll is vital for the photosynthesis, which allows fruit energy to absorb from sunlight.
15 Video Art of an intervention in 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 Muhaned Taha
“Isn’t it time for a change of our own, if Iraq will meet only 15% of its water demand in 2035?” Muhaned Taha is asking. Recent studies predict that Iraq will meet only 15% of its water demand by 2035 if current trends continue. Muhaned Taha responded to this magic number and placed a large-scale banner in the Tigris river under Al Sarafiya Bridge with the number 15 written on it. His intervention is an appeal to local communities and citizens to contribute to responsible consumption and production of water resources. Video:
QUESTIONING ARCHEOLOGICAL HILLS Painting: Noor Abd Ali Text: Hella Mewis
Noor Abd Ali is questioning in her painting archeological hills in Thi Qar Governorate which are misused as hills of ‘mistakes’. But, what mistake are we talking about and who consider it as mistake? A report by women’s right activist Jannat Al Ghazzi, published in 2012 by Mosawat Magazine, resurfaced in 2020 on several media platforms, discussing its details again. Jannat Al Ghazzi refers to her visit of Sir Al Tal. Sir Al Tal literally means the hill of mistakes.
ALERT Photo of an intervention in 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 Tarkib Collaboration As part of the preparations for CYCLE we took water probes from the Tigris and Euphrates rivers and from the Marshes, in order to test the water quality. One of the indicators of a water quality test is its pH value. The results of the liquid pH-tests we did, reached the highest possible score: 8,2 - represented by the colour pink. Pink in the pH-test means ALERT - an alarming situation. For Baghdad Walk we decided to use one of the advertising columns in Haifa Street to colour it pink and to shine a spotlight on the alarming fact that there is not only water scarcity in Iraq, but the water is polluted as well. Girls and women are the most affected part of the society suffering of water scarcity and pollution. Why? Because water belongs to household duties and girls and women are the ones responsible for it. Families living in a rural environment are more affected from water scarcity and pollution than those living in cities. Girls and women are also threatened by the habits and behaviours that can lead to so-called honour killings. This is the story of Marwa:
WEAVING ARTICLES Text: Hella Mewis Design: Atef Al Jaffal AR: Amir Akram The poster states numbers of articles, which are legal provisions in Iraqi law that condone violence against women. Augmented Reality shows the four sources: Iraq Penal Code (of 1969, and as amended in 2010), the Iraqi Constitution, the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Iraqi Civil Code. The weaving design underlines that discriminative laws in the legal system come along with tribal customary laws that all together create significant impediments for improving women’s socio-economic status and participation. The list of articles is not intended to be exhausted, but an exemplary proof for girl’s and women’s injustice in Iraq. The World Bank recently estimated that bringing women’s participation in the labour force to MENA regional levels would increase Iraq’s GDP per capita by almost 31%. The pre-condition for the latter mentioned fact is to create the needed legal environment and to improve the legislative. Continue Reading:
BLOODY NIGHT Sculpture: Zaid Saad Voice: Maha Atteah Story: Anonymous Despite the manifestation of modernity in Iraqi society, it still follows a masculine tribal system that evades the law in matters of honor. ‘Honor’ crimes most often take the form of murder, although they can also encompass other forms of violence such as physical abuse, confinement, control of movement, deprivation of education, forced marriage, forced suicide and public dishonoring. The sculpture BLOODY NIGHT paints a ‘turquoise’ picture in a true-tolife way. “The deterioration in women’s conditions, in particular, began with the start of the economic embargo in Iraq in 1991, which was a turning point in the living conditions and, consequently, the social relations in the country. The educated middle class had withered, and education was no longer considered the social capital it once was.” Continue Reading:
THE pH IS US Lab Test: Mawada Ahmed AR: Amir Akram
“Studies indicate that any type of disease that occurs within the human body is caused by a change in the pH level in the body. The normal and healthy value in the body is the pink value on the pH paper test, those that we must consume in our daily lives, in the water we drink and wash our bodies with. If you analyze the tap water from your kitchen and the value on the pH paper test is exposed to green, you will change the pH of the surface of your skin and body. When we review the rest of the tests and discover the waters of the Tigris river and Ahwar, we realize that this is not the healthy environment we want to live in.” Mawada Ahmed
FLIGHT OF SURVIVAL AR Poster Amir Akram
Enter the surreal world where fish fly in Iraq’s drying marshes. These ‘flight of survival’ are real and we bring AR poster for ‘Flight of survival’. Learn the irony of a land which used to be filled with life, but is now transformed as fins have turned into wings.
CLIMATE MIGRATION Painting: Noor Abd Ali AR: Amir Akram
Climate migration is already a reality in Iraq. At the end of 2021, IOM recorded approximately 20,000 people displaced due to water scarcity, high salinity, and poor water quality across Iraq (looking at only 10 of 19 governorates). All governorates are affected by water scarcity and the number is constantly raising, but due to a lack of systematic tracking mechanism as well as unregistered settlements an exact statistic information is not available. Noor Abd Ali’s painting gives a human face to climate-induced displacements showing symbols of objects that are either left or found. The impact of climate migration, which is nor organized nor prepared, form a new source of conflicts and insecurity, visible via Augmented Reality.
CLIMATE MIGRATION NEW SOURCE OF CONFLICTS AND INSECURITY Tribal Conflicts In-migration leads to urbicide Increase of illegal housing and slums Pressure on municipal services and housing Treated as pariahs Tensions between residents and local authorities Inter-provincial conflicts Exodus from areas effected by ecocide Feeling of marginalization and neglect Insecure tenure arrangement especially for women Unequal distribution of water Recruitment to specific groups Push factor for drop-out of school Increase of child labor Increase of child marriage
FRAGMENTATION MORPHOLOGY Poster Design: Ali Ziyad AR: Amir Akram
The formation of variables in city planning calls for a basic philosophical idea, as the social and environmental fabric has on humans and society. They are necessary questions about identity and human spirituality in a world in which people are disintegrated and people are only partially disconnected. This hybrid urban planning combines with the Renaissance deeply philosophically, forcing us to think about how to achieve connectivity, solidarity and meaningful communities in fragmented cities. Is it possible to live happily and in balance in a place that allows communication and cultivates atmosphere? Can the city, an urban entity, be a source of human values and spirituality? Can philosophy be concerned with how to build cities that are compatible with the greatest aspects of humanity?
MISSING
FRAGMENTATION MORPHOLOGY Poster Design: Ali Ziyad
In this context, we discover that urban health is a philosophical form that prompts us to search for the basic elements of society and spirituality. We are constantly discussing how cities are designed, socially constructed, and humanly expressed. Urban morphology is the study of urban forms and of the agents and processes responsible for their transformation over time. Urban form refers to the main physical elements that structure and shape the city including streets, squares, the public space, street blocks, plots, and buildings, to name the most important.
GROUNDWATER MISUSE IN SOUTHERN IRAQ Text: Hella Mewis Design: Atef Al Jaffal AR: Amir Akram
Iraq has abundant surface water resources compared to other countries in the Arabian Peninsula. Due to mismanagement and interventions in the upstream of Tigris and Euphrates rivers and their tributaries by riparian countries surface water has become a scarce resource. Iraq’s groundwater could play an important role, but studies corroborated, that the future of groundwater would be similar to that of surface water if it continues to be arbitrarily drained like in present days. The poster design visualizes tectonic movements. Augmented Reality visualizes our demand: “If we continue to exploit the groundwater, we will affect the internal tectonic environment which will lead to earthquakes in future.” Continue Reading:
SAWA Sculpture: Found Object, 21.03.2023 Text: Hella Mewis Photo: Hella Mewis Sawa Lake or ‘The Pearl of the South’ as it called in common parlance, represents an impressive geological site. It is located 23 km in the South-West direction of Samawa city, the capital of Al Muthanna Governorate, in an area of the so-called sabkha (salt flat). The source of its water is groundwater through a spring in the lakebed. The lake is surrounded by a cliff of piled sand dunes, providing a natural levee that keeps the water above ground level. The coast of Sawa Lake looks like as a natural landform gallery. It represents major stages of earth’s history, including geological processes in the development of landforms, or significant geomorphic or physiographic features. Especially the western coast is dominated by picturesque cone-shaped blocks of gypsum, natural sculptures formed by geological processes. These gypsiferous creatures formed by dissolution and precipitation processes are natural mechanisms rarely occur in the world. Due to groundwater misuse ‘the pearl of the south’ has completely dried up in 2022. What happened with these creatures if the natural protection is missing?
SAWA FENCE Photo: Hella Mewis AR: Amir Akram
The photo was taken during a field trip to Sawa Lake on March 21, 2023. It is a snap shot of a distinctive situation. The older generation’s gesture expresses the strengths that Iraq has natural wonders, but in fact, they are treating it unconsciously with contempt. The younger generation is wondering and trying to discover what is in front of them, unconsciously? How can we protect our natural wonders? Via AR we demonstrate a solution. Sawa Lake needs a fence to protect what is left, even though the creatures will disappear after a while due to natural and meteorological effects. But, at least it will expand their life time.
WATER SHARE Hologram Photography Zaid Saad
The two holograms show Zaid Saad taking water from the Atatürk Reservoir in Turkey which is filled with plenty of fresh Euphrates river water in order to release it back into the Euphrates river downstream in Al Musayyab nearby Kerbela in Iraq. The Atatürk Reservoir and the Atatürk Dam are part of Turkey’s multi-sector regional development Southeastern Anatolia Project (GAP) established in 1989. The GAP project and due to the lack of an official agreement on water sharing between the riparian countries (Turkey, Syria and Iraq) led and leads to significant reductions in water shares for both the Euphrates and Tigris rivers resulting in extreme low flow of surface water downstream in Syria and Iraq.
AHWAR UNDER MICROSCOPE Lab Test: Mawada Ahmed Shooting: Mounir Saleh The water conflict in the Euphrates-Tigris basin has a long history. For centuries, the riparian countries (Iraq, Turkey and Syria) have failed to reach a strategic agreement in water shares, mainly because the region has no strategic vision in terms of an in-depth assessment of challenges and opportunities. Each country only focuses on a national scale, with less attention paid to the bigger picture. The Euphrates river is the main source to feed Ahwar Southern Iraq. The traces of failed water politics are already visible and tangible. But what happened with the invisible micro-parts of the eco-system? The structures of these algae mirror exemplary the situation in Ahwar Southern Iraq. Taken from the lake Baghdadiye in the Central Marshes a few kilometers north-east of the city of Shubayish, you can see under microscope the effect of desiccation on biodiversity. The cells have shrunk and many are dead. Continue Reading (Research by Maees Hadi):
AHWAR 1984 - 2022 Video Amir Akram
Until to the 1950s, the estimated extend of Ahwar Southern Iraq, which is divided into Al Hammar, Central and Al Hawizeh, was 20,000 square kilometers. Continue Reading:
PIZZA À LA AHWAR Sculptural Relief Loay Al Hadhary
The relief captures the way of serving food typically for southern Iraq. The main foods are bread and fish, everything what can be provided by mother nature. The circle shape of the bread reminds on a pizza, at least for people from ‘Western cultures’. For Loay Al Hadhary it is more the reminder of ancient traditions, which root back to the Sumerian times, a culture of traditions, that seems to get into oblivion, because the basic elements are disappearing: water and fishes. Once the bread was placed with grilled fish of various kinds which used to live in the Marshes such as Buni, Chalk, Kattan, Khishni, Shabbut etc. Will the relief be the only reminder?
MAGROOD IS LOOKING FOR WATAN Poster Design Tarkib Pinky Team The poster design is a composition merging a painting, a slogan and a graphic designed future prospective. Magrood is a character developed by the young painter Tabi. The word describes the disadvantaged, the unfortunates, and the forgotten who neither give benefit nor cause harm to the society or themselves. The painting shows Tabi’s Magrood in the middle of Haifa Street in 2021. She included different elements and symbols that she had found around Haifa Street and that are part of the puzzle of the young generation’s quest: words and numbers written on walls, mirrored; bullet holes visible in the arches and on the building’s facades; the eight-pointed star at the top of the painting, a reminiscence to the former dictatorship era under Saddam Hussein. Magrood is a character that represent the young generation, searching for identity. Watan, is not the name of a person. Watan means homeland. Therefore, Magrood is searching for her homeland. The colour green is one of the pan-Arab colours - and part of the Iraqi flag. It stands for purity, fertility, and peace, as well as for hope. Will Magrood be able to find her Watan?
A BULLET CAN’T KILL OUR COURAGE Poster Design Tarkib Pinky Team The two photo elements in the poster design show moments captured during the 2019 Youth Tishreen Uprising. During a walk on the beach, three persons found the slogan written on a wall “A BULLET CAN’T KILL OUR COURAGE”, which was a message to something tangible in the horizon. Bread is elementary to an adequate nutrition, but our bread is pink. The colour pink is for us a kind of protest, but a protest to bring the world to the better. The poster is signed with: “To the people after 100 years from the date of today: Instant protest. HTA”. Instant protest is a letter font, the ‘weapon’ of a graphic designer. Our instant protest is resistance. Iraq has its experience of instant protests in the past 100 years and will have it in the next 100 years. Will instant protest change the way how humans deal with nature and customs?
20 YEARS AFTER Poster Design Lwaa Shams Aldeen
What are the most common features of the twenty-years period after the 2003 events? For Lwaa Shams Aldeen there must be smoke. He depicted the underside of the map of Iraq with the two rivers Tigris and Euphrates as Iraq’s pillars, the land between two rivers. Iraq’s pillars are burning as the result of years of turmoil and the new impact of climate change.
THE INTELLECTUAL’S HEART 2D Relief Diyar Ziyad
The first to be affected by wars are the intellectuals. They of all kinds fear for their homelands from being lost. They wrote and drew their homelands while they were being buried in exile. Their pens bled before their hearts in poetry, love, and ink.
G A R D E N THE LOST ERA Hanging Installation Sculpture Ayşe
The neglect and lack of knowledge that our civilization was subjected to, caused the loss of our identity and the loss of all the features of our ancient civilization as the first civilization in the world. On the contrary, the role turned against us this time, so what are the reasons for all of this if we reflect it on the way we form our cities.
ALSHESME Photo Series of an intervention in 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 Taqi Mohammed
Taqi Mohammed’s performance started when he leant over the railing of Al Sarafiya Bridge to pull up a bucket full of water from the Tigris river. He lifted the bucket to the other side of the railing and put it to ground. Exhausted from the heavy load he rested, before exploring his catch. He caught five files cards of corpses found dead in the Tigris, with information about each case and photos of potential evidence. Shocked about his findings he left the scene. What is the life, the story and the reason for each death? Why does the river carry corpses, some discovered, some unnoticed? The title refers to Ahmed Al Saadawi’s novel “Frankenstein in Baghdad”. The novel centers on Hadi’s monster-like creation who he calls Whatsitsname in English or Al Shesme in Arabic. Hadi collected pieces of corpses, remnants of different violence acts that represent every part of the Iraqi community and stitched together a composite corpse.
EXTEND OF AHWAR 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 Tarkib Collaboration
A banner was placed on an unused electronic advertising display at the beginning of Al Sarafiya Bridge in Al Karkh side. It showed two landsat satellite images from Earthshots comparing the Mesopotamian Marshes in summer 1972 at nearly their maximum extent compared to its remains in summer 2023. The big-size banner is a reminder of an alarming situation. Iraq’s natural wonder remains vulnerable to upstream dam construction, drainage for agriculture, oil exploration, war, drought, desertification, climate change and international conflict. Continue Reading:
MY LEEFE Textile Work Hussam Mohammed 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 MY LEEFE is a rectangle textile work made out of typical Iraqi back scrubbers. It is the artist’s protest banner to demand clean water and sanitation. Iraqis have, for years now, been using water for washing that is contaminated with feces, oil, and wastewater which is a significant source of many diseases that Iraqis suffer from. In the center of his protest banner, one back scrubber is coloured in dark green while the others remain in their natural colour. He took the colour from our laboratory test examining the quality of the water of the Tigris river nearby. The test results indicated that the water quality is not safe for drinking and washing. What will you do, if you do not have water and the little bit of water left is polluted?
15 Photo of an intervention in 6. BAGHDAD WALK 2023 Intervention: Muhaned Taha Photo: Hella Mewis Muhaned Taha’s intervention ‘15’ is addressing both, the water scarcity and the pollution of the water in Iraq. The number 15 refers to the forecast that Iraq will meet only 15% of its water demand in 2035. The banner was placed in the Tigris river under Al Sarafiya Bridge, nearby the smoking chimney were the waste of the Medical City is burned. Hence, the number 15 refers to another environmental key fact. Of the total amount of waste generated by health-care activities, about 85% is non-hazardous waste. The remaining 15% is considered hazardous that may be infectious, toxic or radioactive.
SMOKING CHIMNEY Photograph Taqi Mohammed
The photo is capturing the smoking chimney belonging to the Medical City. The chimney smokes every day, several times a day. Black smoke is a sign that combustion is not taking place correctly and therefore many pollutants are released into the environment. Incineration is considered one of the effective ways to dispose of medical waste, but that goes with a large quantity of heavy metals and reactive, toxic materials produced, if the proper medical waste management is missing.
HFEED Poster-Installation Lwaa Shams Aldeen
An installation of posters designs that addresses in a satirical and sarcastic way the environmental and social catastrophe that the Iraqi Marshes are facing and the painful reality experienced by its inhabitants.